


Shoot Me Down

by AgentStannerShipper



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-12
Updated: 2013-09-12
Packaged: 2017-12-26 10:10:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,972
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/964728
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AgentStannerShipper/pseuds/AgentStannerShipper
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Clint has had feelings for Natasha for a while, but he's not quite sure how to tell her.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Shoot Me Down

Clint's P.O.V.  
I had long since grown accustom to this. The teamwork, the solo missions, killing, not killing, and everything else this work threw at me. I could deal with it. I could handle the pressure. Because of her.  
Everything about her could stand as beautiful all on its own, but put together, she had the looks of an angel and the personality of a demon, not to mention the hair. And when I say that, I mean it as a compliment. If you really knew who I was, you'd understand.  
I had long since debated telling her how I felt. Things had gone badly between us several times, even without romantic involvement. We had been partners once, before she betrayed me. Later, she worked with me again, and she has done everything possible to make up for what she did.  
Even so, she had difficulty cooperating with others. It could have come from any number of things in her past, but I like to think it was because of me. If I hadn't done what I did, she wouldn't have been forced to turn on me, to save herself.  
So, with all these thoughts still turning through my head, I joined her and the Avengers at the meeting table, something we had not done since Loki had been taken down. I was careful not to look at her. I couldn't slip up. We were partners again, that was it. I couldn't risk making things go badly...again.  
But even so, I kept glancing at her, hoping she didn't notice. Then Nick Fury's voice brought me back to what was going on. "I'm sure you're all wondering why I've called you back here," he said.  
"Wonderful way to state the obvious, Fury," Tony Stark's annoying voice interrupted. I had never been a big fan of Tony, but after almost dying when the portal closed I'd have thought he would have toned down a bit. I was very wrong.  
The other former Avengers (or maybe we were still Avengers, I didn't know) looked more uncomfortable. Certainly, Bruce Banner was, although he did seem less nervous around everyone than he had before, excluding Stark. Steve looked like he'd rather be elsewhere. So would I. Maybe a nice, romantic evening with Natasha... No. I had to focus. Partners, and that was it. Thor was still on Asguard, so he did not come to the gathering.  
Nick Fury spoke as if Tony had not, "there's a problem."  
I leaned over the table, my hands clasped in front of me, "what sort of problem?"  
"The HYDRA sort," Fury responded, causing me to lean back again. I had to look over at Natasha, to see her reaction. No one else would have noticed it, the struggle to maintain a calm outward appearance, but I had known her to long to miss it.  
"What's HYDRA been doing that's so important as to call all of us here at once?" Steve asked, still sounding slightly out of date. I remembered, Natasha wasn't the only one with a personal reason to hate HYDRA.  
"That's the problem," Fury said, "we've monitored there actions in the past few months, and they're busier than ever. But we don't know with what."  
"So what," Stark had that look on his face, the one that only brought trouble, "you figure, 'hey let's send in the Avengers, and shut down HYDRA without giving them anything to work with. It doesn't even matter if they all get killed off, we'll just replace them!' Does that sound fun to anyone else?"  
For once, Tony sounded intelligent. I hated to admit it, but he had a point. SHEILD didn't care what happened to us, so long as we got the job done, when they asked, how they asked. I had plenty of experience in that department.  
Natasha spoke for the first time, her voice harsh, although it sounded just as beautiful to me, "What exactly do you want us to do?"  
Nick Fury smiled, like he was glad someone had finally gotten to the point, "I want you, Agent Romanov, and the rest of you, to infiltrate HYDRA headquarters. I want you to find out what they're up to, and then I want you to get out, understood?"  
"So this is a strictly non-fighting mission?" Bruce asked, fidgeting slightly. When Fury nodded he asked, "then why am I here? Wouldn't it make more sense just to send in Hawkeye and Black Widow?"  
"That it would," Fury acknowledged, "which is why they will be the only ones who actually enter the building. The rest of you will be monitoring what they find over this." He held out a small device, one that would easily fit into the ear canal. "You will then take the information and analyze it. Find out the possibilities."  
"When are you dropping us?" I asked, tired of the conversation.  
"In about two hours," Fury answered.  
"Two hours?" Natasha said curiously, "that's cutting it awfully close, director."  
"He just didn't want us to have a chance to say no," I muttered.  
Two hours later...  
Natasha was standing next to me. I might have been named for a bird (Hawkeye, not my real name), but I wasn't too crazy about jumping out of planes. Or off of hovercrafts, or whatever the technical name for this thing was. Not that I showed it.  
"You ready?" I asked my partner, trying to keep my voice even. I think I did a fairly good job, because she didn't look at me.  
"I'm ready," she replied.  
And with that, we jumped out of the plane. By the time we got to the ground, we were ready for stealth. Personally, I would have preferred running in there with my bow loaded.  
Natasha looked a little nervous, something almost no one else would have picked up on, "you okay, Tasha?"  
"I'm fine," she snapped, but her eyes told a different story. I wanted to hug her, to tell her it would be all right. But that was something I couldn't let myself do.  
We crept up to the building, not letting ourselves be seen by the guards. I boosted Natasha up to the roof, and she helped pull me up after her. Working with her like this felt good, but her lips probably would too...  
Trying to ignore that last thought, I followed after her, across the nearly unguarded rooftop, to the best way into the building. An air vent. I pried it off, and crawled in first.  
After getting through the vent, we crouched, balancing on the ceiling beams. The entire place was crawling with HYDRA workers. We probably didn't have long until we were discovered.  
"What are they doing?" Natasha muttered, looking down at them.  
"It could be a new kind of weapon," I said, studying the mechanical pieces some people carried.  
"That looks to be the case," Tony's voice responded in my ear. I had almost forgotten that they could see and hear everything Natasha and I could.  
"I'm going for a closer look," Natasha whispered to me.  
"Be careful," I responded.  
That earned me a funny look, "since when have you told me to be careful?"  
"Since now," I muttered evasively. She just shook her head, her red hair darting around her face. Then she hopped down from the beam.  
I kept one eye on her, but at the same time I was trying to figure out what HYDRA was doing. It wasn't until I heard her gasp that I fully realized where she was.  
Natasha stood, several feet down from me, in her hands a computer disk.  
I jumped down to land beside her, "what do you have there, Tasha?"  
Wordlessly, she held the disk out to me. I saw it wasn't just one disk, it was several, all neatly put away into a pouch. The first one was labeled: Black Widow.  
"They have all your information on file," I said, knowing this is what had Natasha silent.  
I didn't say anything else, because every single thing I wanted to say, I really didn't want the other Avengers to hear. And not to mention, saying them would break my promise to myself. So I just looked at the other disks, also labeled. There was one on each Avenger, two for SHEILD itself, and one unmarked disk.  
"We have to get these back to the hellicarrier," Natasha whispered. She sounded frightened, something that was unusual.  
"I agree," I said. The sooner we got out of here, the better.  
"You two aren't going anywhere," Fury's voice came on for the first time, "so you got a few files. They could just be old disks. We need to figure out what HYDRA's doing now!"  
Natasha but her lip, but she didn't say anything about it. Instead, she muttered, "lets just get this over with."  
She swung down to land on the ground. I followed after her, careful not to be spotted. As we crept toward the workers, and their project, I heard them talking quietly.  
About us.  
Natasha froze, listening to them, transfixed. I stopped as well, wanting to hear what they had to say.  
"The boss expects a visit from his favorite assassins any day now," the first one said.  
"You mean Hawkeye and Black Widow?" the other responded, "I thought they were dead."  
"Not by a long shot," the first guy said, "there's been a rumor going around since the Widow left, you know. They said she didn't want anything to do with HYDRA because that Hawkeye, her old partner, was working for SHEILD."  
"Why would that stop the Widow?" the second one asked.  
"Well, that's the word," the first guy answered. Natasha was white, tugging at my arm, trying to get me to move, but I had to listen. Because the first man continued, "they say she loved him."  
My heart soared. But then reality shook me back to earth. That was just a rumor among the workers. A reason for Natasha to have left, without it being their fault. The likelihood of it being true was very slim.  
I turned to Natasha, my face blank. She was still frozen, calculating my expression. She must have deemed it safe, because she turned and gestured for me to follow her. As we turned a corner, we ran directly into some workers.  
"Crap," I muttered as they sounded an alarm. Next to me, Natasha's swears were more colorful, and interspersed with Russian ones.  
"Abort the mission, I repeat, abort the mission," Fury's voice yelled in my ear.  
Tony was less official, "get the hell out of there!"  
Natasha and I did just that, running as fast as we could, evading obstacles, and dodging weapons that fired at us. By the time we got to the beach, the helicopter was waiting to pick us up.  
We held on fast to the ladder as it pulled up, carrying us to the hellicarrier. Another blast was fired, and Natasha's grip on the ladder loosened. She screamed as she started to fall, and it sounded just slightly like my name.  
I caught her around the waist, pulling her closer to me, not letting her fall. The helicopter landed, and we stumbled off, shaking.  
I pulled the device out of my ear, and Natasha did the same. "You okay?" I asked her, now that the others couldn't hear us.  
I didn't hear her reply, but it sounded a lot like, "not really."  
We entered, with Fury already waiting for us. His face was disappointed, "you two are getting sloppy. You should have been in and out of there without being caught."  
"With all due respect, sir," Natasha said, her voice in control again, "had you let us pull out when we requested, HYDRA wouldn't have known we were there."  
"Just get to the lab," Fury frowned, "they're waiting for you." He stalked off down the hallway, clearly disgruntled.  
We did just that, Natasha still clutching the bag of disks. I thought she had dropped it when she almost fell, but apparently she had secured it to her belt.  
The others looked up as we entered. Banner was examining some data on one of the high-tech screens. Tony had been typing commands into another one. The Captain just looked baffled by the technology.  
Tony was the first to speak, and as usual it wasn't helpful, "so when's the honeymoon?"  
That caught me off guard, "what?"  
Tony grinned, pressing a button on the keyboard he was working with, and part of the feed played, "they say she loved him."  
Natasha looked like she was trying to cover up something, an emotion I had never seen cross her face before, "it's none of your damn business, Tony."  
"Oh, feisty," Tony grinned, "she's a real charmer, Barton."  
Natasha looked furious, and Bruce decided to speak, playing peacemaker, "Tony, I don't know if you understand what provoking Natasha means. You'd probably do better with the, um, other guy." He was still clearly uncomfortable with talking about that.  
Natasha looked pleased that he'd compared her to the Hulk. After all, he'd almost crushed her once, back when I had been under Loki's spell, and tried to kill her a little later. I'd been filled in on the details.  
"Let's see those disks, then," I said, steering the topic in a different direction. Natasha handed the bag to me, and I pulled out the disks.  
The others didn't see me slip Natasha's disk back to her, but when she felt it in her hand she mouthed, "thank you."  
I handed Tony the next one, mine. He popped it into the disk drive, and we gathered around the screen to see what it contained.  
Most of my information was on there, anything HYDRA had gotten their hands on, some shots of me in action included. The same was true of the disks on the other Avengers, although no one noticed we hadn't seen Natasha's disk. They were most likely too interested on the SHIELD disks. Some of the information even we hadn't known about.  
Then came the last disk. "What do you think is on it?" Captain Rodgers asked.  
"Well, let's find out," Tony said, and he slipped it into the computer. When the screen came up, we all froze.  
It was HYDRA's leader on the screen, smiling. "Hello Avengers," he said.  
"Tell me this isn't live," I muttered.  
"It's not," Tony said, "this was all recorded. He must have wanted us to get the disks."  
"You are no doubt wondering what HYDRA is planning," the man onscreen continued, "it is very simple, really. We are going to tear each and every one of you apart, both physically and mentally. You know from the previous disks that we know almost everything about you. We will use this. We will take every last piece of information, and turn it against you, until you realized you've become your worst nightmare."  
Bruce had long since paled, but he looked even more terrified at this part. Tony looked worried, and the Captain seemed highly concerned. Natasha, on the other hand, had her face as blank as possible.  
The man spoke once more, "oh, and to Hawkeye and the Black Widow, I send this message. It is because of you that HYDRA had lost many times. When we get you, we have something special planned. There is nothing more entertaining than two traitorous lovers, fighting each other to the death. Be warned." The screen blanked, and the disk slid out.  
"We need to get this to Fury," Steve said. Tony handed him the disks, and he was off.  
"Well, I'm going to bed," Tony announced.  
"How can you sleep?" I asked.  
"It's not that hard, Barton. You should try it sometime," Tony responded, leaving too. Bruce stayed at his lab bench, once again absorbed in his work, although I could see that what he had just seen was threatening to push him over the edge.  
I felt Natasha slip away, and followed her. She didn't turn as she walked down the hall, but she clearly knew I was there, because she said, "did you want something, Clint?"  
"You looked kind of nervous back there," I said, walking beside her.  
"Anything HYDRA can use against me, or any of us, is a thing to be worried about, Clint," she said simply.  
I tried a different approach, "so. Traitorous lovers. Is that what HYDRA thinks we are?"  
"Just HYDRA?" Natasha muttered, almost so low I didn't catch it.  
"What was that?" I asked, my better judgment telling me to ignore it. But I had been ignoring it for too long.  
Natasha had reached her room by now, and opened the door. She acted as if she had not heard me, entering and trying to close the door behind her.  
I wasn't about to let her do that. I stopped the door with my foot, "I heard you say something, Tasha. What was it?"  
Natasha sighed, and the door swung open so that I could see her, "I said it wasn't just HYDRA, okay?"  
"Since when are we 'traitorous lovers'?" I asked, raising an eyebrow.  
"Well, it's not like we haven't betrayed each other plenty," Natasha said quietly.  
"And...?" I pushed, wanting an answer. I was so close to finding out how she felt about me.  
"And," Natasha murmured, closing her eyes, "I was compromised."  
Only an assassin would know what that meant. But even though I knew, I wanted to hear her say it out loud, "compromised?"  
Natasha opened her eyes and looked me square in the face, "I fell in love, Clint. With you."  
I stepped into her room and did something I had wanted to do for a very long time. I kissed her. When I pulled away, I whispered, "I was compromised too. I love you, Natasha."

**Author's Note:**

> My first Clintasha one-shot. Depending on reactions, I might make this a full story. What do you think?


End file.
